


The Memories That Last

by dizzy



Category: Glee RPF, StarKid Productions RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-26
Updated: 2013-02-26
Packaged: 2017-12-03 15:58:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/700020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dizzy/pseuds/dizzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris and Joey have a history. Darren doesn't know. (Until he does.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Memories That Last

 *

Chris meets Joey at an audition in Los Angeles. They’re both fresh out of high school, Joey bound for Michigan in the fall and Chris bound for Clovis Community College under growing protest. This summer is the last chance either of them will have to try and land a job before they’re churned through the educational system.    
  
They’re going for the same part, but neither of them get it. Neither of them are even remotely close to what they want for the role.    
  
That either of them even got a foot in the door is shocking. But as they walk out toward the parking garage, Joey asks for Chris’s number and they both walk away with something more than just dashed dreams.    
  
Chris is back in Los Angeles the next weekend. He tells his parents he has an audition. What he actually has is a date. It ends with them making out in the backseat of his car and a promise to see each other again the following weekend.    
  
The entire summer passes in a rush of moments that Chris will look back on later with bittersweet fondness for the first boy to ever hold his hand, the first boy to kiss him and look at him like Chris was really what he wanted most in life.    
  
Then summer had ended and Joey’d gotten on a plane and that had been it; a few phone calls here and there, then the calls faded into text messages, and then on into nothing but stretching silence.    


[[MORE]]

  
*    
  
Chris doesn’t actually try and get to know his co-stars that well. When it happens, it happens naturally. The people that have been around since the start, since he was fresh faced and new in Hollywood, they know him pretty well and he knows them precisely as well as they want him to.    
  
So when he gets this new co-star, this new  guy that’s supposed to be his on-screen partner, and he’s hesitant to show any sort of attachment. He can already predict how this will go: enthusiastic newcomer, nice enough, and Chris will watch him get sucked into the Hollywood spiral of press and public relations and he’ll realize that Chris isn’t the kind of guy his people want him exactly associating with and... that’ll be that.    
  
He’s not at all expecting Darren Criss.    
  
He’s not expecting a guy that not only laughs at Chris’s jokes, but actually makes jokes of his own that Chris  wants to laugh at. He’s not expecting someone that, over the course of a year and a kiss and a summer and a tour and another kiss, worms his way into Chris’s life and into his heart.    
  
He isn’t expecting to fall in love and he’s definitely not expecting Darren to fall right along with him.    
  
*    
  
They dance around it for a while.    
  
There are a handful of moments that show them the potential, nights spent talking long past when they should sleep. Chris wants to know everything about Darren and Darren has this way of coaxing secrets and stories out of Chris like no one else ever has.    
  
The first time they fall asleep together Chris dreams of having kids and Darren is there. He wakes up terrified and barely talks to Darren for a week, but they get over the rough spot and bounce back even harder.    
  
The first time Darren kisses him for real - not on set, not on stage - Chris thinks he could cry with how perfect it feels. When Darren comes back a week later and says, “Just so you know, I’m single now. Officially.” it feels like a promise as much as a declaration.    
  
But they don’t rush. Suddenly, they don’t need to; they’ve got time.    
  
*    
  
Coming back to California after the tour is like dropping back onto solid ground after spending a couple of months in orbit. Suddenly Darren isn’t conveniently in his space nonstop. Time together becomes an effort not a given, but they’ve got a trickier road to navigate. No one knows yet - but they might suspect, but in this industry suspicion is almost as damning as proof .   
  
He’s nervous about how real life will slot in, but Chris lives alone and they’re filming together so much - somehow, it still works. They don’t have real dates but they have nights in, nights where they can let exploratory kisses turn deeper. Whatever had been stopping them before is gone; they fall into bed together with as much ease as they’d fallen in love.    
  
It’s three months into the filming season when Darren says, “My buddy from college just graduated and he’s moving out here. I asked him if he wants to move in with me.”    
  
“Yeah?” Chris asks. They’re stretched out on the couch together, enjoying a movie and each other’s company.    
  
“Yeah. I kind of want you to meet him,” Darren says. “I trust him, you know? I want you to be able to come around to my place, and us to be ourselves.”    
  
Chris turns his face into Darren’s neck to hide his smile. His arms snug tighter around Darren’s middle and he slides his thigh over Darren’s. “I would love to.”    
  
*    
  
The next weekend, he lets himself into Darren’s house. He’d texted in advance and been told that they were putting together the bed upstairs and he could just come join them when he got there.    
  
He puts the deli order he’d picked up for lunch on the table and takes the stairs two at a time, a smile already on his face. If this guy is one of Darren’s best friends, Chris already knows he’ll love him.    
  
“I’m here,” he calls out, heading for the formerly-guest room. His eyes go straight to Darren first, stomach flipping pleasantly-   
  
and then dropping entirely.    
  
*    
  
Joey won’t meet his eyes.    
  
Joey. It’s  Joey .    
  
The same Joey that kissed him under a pier and made his heart melt with a crooked smile and fumbling confession.    
  
The same Joey that gave him his first blowjob in the parking lot behind a gas station and made him want to cry with how good he felt.    
  
The same Joey who had whispered  I love you and really looked like he meant it, who encouraged him to go to audition after audition, who spent hours on the phone with him when he stewed over how miserable he knew college would be and how much he didn’t want to go.    
  
The same Joey that he hadn’t expected to ever see again, and certainly not in his boyfriend’s house.    
  
Chris turns and walks out of the room, downstairs. He actually considers just leaving, but he can’t do that. He knows he needs to talk to Darren and explain, since Joey obviously hasn’t.    
  
He hears raised voices upstairs and then footsteps coming down. He’s not sure who it is. He’s sure who he wants it to be, though, and there’s nothing but relief when Darren walks into the kitchen.    
  
“Chris?” He asks, eyes warm and concerned. “What happened? Joey wouldn’t say a fucking word.”    
  
Joey’s voice breaks in. “I’m sorry.”    
  
They both look at him. Chris is guarded,  hurt \- hurt and he’s not sure why, except that seeing Joey right there makes him feel eighteen and lost again, even though it’s not even solely Joey’s fault that they lost touch.    
  
Darren looks back and forth between them. “I am clearly missing something here. Fill me in?”    
  
“We dated,” Chris says. He swallows hard at the shock and - what else is it? Disbelief ? Curiosity? Maybe a little of both on his face.   
  
“Years ago,” Joey breaks in to add. “Before we met, man. Before college.”    
  
“You two...” Darren repeats slowly. “... dated? And you didn’t fucking tell me, Joe?”    
  
“I didn’t know how,” Joey says weakly. He finally looks over at Chris, genuinely apology in his eyes. “I’m sorry. It was just unbel iev ably awkward to realize my best friend was dating my first boyfriend, okay? And I thought I was staying in Chicago until like, two weeks ago when you invited me here, and I kind of panicked. I was gonna tell you-”    
  
Darren leans back against the counter and then laughs, but it’s the most mirthless sound Chris has maybe ever heard him make. “I love how fucked up the universe can be.”    
  
He turns and walks out of the room.   
  
*    
  
Chris leaves a few minutes after that.    
  
He’s actually thought, in the back of his mind, that if he ever saw Joey again he’d have a million things to say.    
  
He could have found Joey on facebook if he’d really wanted to. He could have looked him up online. He could have tried the number that’s still saved in his phone contacts, just to see if it still worked. He hadn’t, because part of him had been very comfortable leaving the past in the past, but that hadn’t stopped him from being curious.    
  
Now that Joey’s in front of him, he just has nothing to say.    
  
*    
  
He doesn’t hear from Darren for another day. The entire night is spent with Ashley, and a bottle of tequila, and a marathon on the history channel full of misinformation and facts he already knows.    
  
Ashley’s a good friend, though. She’s good at distracting him. She’s okay when he doesn’t explain what happened. She doesn’t grill him when he starts to tell her about his first boyfriend. She doesn’t ask why he doesn’t say Darren’s name even once throughout the night.    
  
*    
  
Chris is hungover the next morning, but he’s had worse. He still gets up and makes breakfast. He’s halfway through a plate of eggs that really aren’t his best effort when the doorbell rings.    
  
Darren has a key, but apparently felt the need to announce his presence officially.    
  
“So... were you in love?” Darren asks point blank.    
  
Chris holds the door open so Darren can come in. He waits until they’re back in the kitchen to speak again. “Breakfast?”    
  
Darren glances over at the eggs in the pan on the stove and then shrugs, grabbing a plate and helping himself while Chris finally answers.    
  
“It wasn’t exactly the heartbreak of a lifetime, but he was, uh. He was my first,” Chris says.    
  
Darren sits across from him at the little table. “Everything?”   
  
“Everything,” Chris clarifies. “So I loved him for that.”    
  
“But...”    
  
“But I was eighteen, and I got Glee about a month after he left, so... I was too busy to pine very much.” Chris shrugs, watching Darren as he takes a bite and then adds salt. “I wasn’t exactly heartbroken, so I don’t think I was in love.”    
  
“What about me?”   
  
“What about you?” It’s not a thing they’ve said - not to each other, at least. He has just enough of a romantic left somewhere inside of him that he hopes this isn’t how that moment goes for them.    
  
“Would you pine for me? Would you be heartbroken?” Darren clarifies.    
  
Chris gives it the thought that it feels like it needs before says, “I don’t think pine is a strong enough word for what I’d do if you broke up with me, or just left like that.”   
  
Darren nods, and smiles.    
  
“So we’re okay?” Chris asks.    
  
Darren has a fork lifted halfway to his mouth. He takes the bite and chews before saying, “Joey and I talked for a while last night. Like, all night. I haven’t slept.”    
  
Worry swoops through Chris. “Oh?”    
  
“Yeah. He’s gonna stay. He said - well, I’m not gonna tell you what he said, because that’s his business if he wants to tell you. But he’s fine with me and you, if you are. And I’m not gonna be that jackass that just fucks him over because of something like this, even if he fucked up by not telling me. So he’s gonna stay, he’s gonna live with me. Is that cool with you?”    
  
“Of course.” It honestly wouldn’t have occurred to Chris to tell Darren anything but that.    
  
Darren smiles. “Then I think we’re okay.”    
  
His shoulders slump in relief and Chris smiles back. “Good.”    
  
*    
  
It’s Darren’s birthday, and he’s drunk.    
  
Really, really, really drunk. He’s drunk and singing and having fun and surrounded by his friends - most of the Chicago bunch, a lot of Glee crew and a few of the cast.    
  
He’s having fun and that means Chris is having fun, albeit a slightly more sober version. He’s spent most of the past hour just watching Darren and making sure he doesn’t bounce off any furniture tall enough to hurt himself when he inevitably falls.    
  
“He’s an idiot. You’re dating an idiot.” Joey says, making Chris jump. He turns and Joey is right there beside him, smiling.    
  
“I know,” Chris says fondly, eyes back on Darren.    
  
Joey’s lived with Darren for over a month now and they haven’t spoken much, not alone. They haven’t put each other in the same shared space, out of apprehension and fear and mutual acknowledgement of shared past chemistry. Chris has absolutely no intention of ever cheating on Darren, but he doesn’t really see the point in tempting fate, either.    
  
But this is Darren’s party and Joey is his best friend and Chris is his boyfriend and they’re all a  little drunk. Chris thinks maybe he’s ready to start thinking of Joey as a friend, because neither of them are probably going to depart from Darren’s life and inner circle any time soon.    
  
So Chris turns to look at him, really lets himself look for the first time. Joey looks right back.    
  
Before he firmly labels Joey as a friend, he has one question, though.    
  
“What did you tell him?” Chris asks. “That first night you were here. He told me you stayed up all night talking, what did you say?”    
  
Joey looks down, then starts to toy with the label on his beer bottle. “I told him about us. He wanted the full story, I gave it to him. And I told him... I told him that you’re better for him than he is for you, since you can’t be out, and you used to dream about having a boyfriend you could go to Paris with. I told him if he ever hurts you that I’d kick his ass and if you ever hurt him, it was probably his fault anyway.”    
  
“And he didn’t punch you?” Chris says, trying to make a joke to cover the punched in the gut feeling he has right now hearing Joey say that with such a note of sincerity in his voice.    
  
“You kidding? He agreed. He’s nuts about you.” Joey smiles. He leans in and bumps Chris’s shoulder with his own. “And I think he’s trying to get your attention right now.”   
  
He looks over at Darren, who is making the biggest sad puppy face at Chris and waving the karaoke mic out in front of him.    
  
Joey plucks the beer bottle out of Chris’s hand. “Go, and enthrall the masses with your vocal prowess.”    
  
Chris takes one look back over at him and smiles, meaning it on more than one level when he says, “Thanks, Joey.” 


End file.
